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THE camera on board the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter is fulfilling its promise. At the end of last year the SpaceDaily website reported that the camera would be able to "see things on the planet as small as a dishwasher" (12 November 2005), and Sky and Space magazine declared that "while previous cameras on other Mars orbiters could identify objects no smaller than a school bus, this camera will be able to see something as small as a dinner table" (3 December 2005).

Now, as several readers have noted, a press release from NASA informs us that "rocks and objects as small as armchairs are revealed in the first image from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter since the spacecraft manoeuvred into its final, low-altitude orbital path".

What all this terrestrial domestic detritus is doing on the planet remains unexplained.